Joseph Koenig whooped with pleasure after he threw a rock right into a passing automobile’s windshield and killed the driving force two years in the past, his good friend testified Friday throughout Koenig’s jury trial in Jefferson County District Courtroom.
Koenig set free the whoop when he noticed 20-year-old Alexa Bartell’s automobile had veered off the street after it was hit with the rock on Indiana Road close to the Rocky Flats Nationwide Wildlife Refuge on April 19, 2023, Nicholas “Mitch” Karol-Chik testified Friday.
“He was excited,” Karol-Chik instructed jurors. “He would simply take a look at us with this huge smile on his face.”
Koenig is charged with first-degree homicide in Bartell’s demise, in addition to tried homicide and associated counts for his position in a rock-throwing spree that authorities say he, Karol-Chik and a 3rd teenager, Zachary Kwak, carried out that evening.
The teenagers threw landscaping rocks at quite a few automobiles, each parked and shifting, earlier than hurling the rock by way of Bartell’s windshield within the final assault of the evening, prosecutors allege. All three males have been 18 on the time of the rock-throwing spree; every is now 20.
Koenig’s celebration after hitting Bartell’s automobile was consistent with how they’d reacted to previous impacts, Karol-Chik testified. The boys would cheer and praise one another each time a rock struck a car, he stated. In the event that they missed, they have been disillusioned, he stated.
Koenig’s protection attorneys have conceded he helped to trigger Bartell’s demise and stated that he must be held accountable. However they argued throughout opening statements that he was responsible not of first-degree homicide, however of the much less severe cost of manslaughter, as a result of not one of the youngsters supposed to harm anybody that evening.
“We solely considered them as automobiles,” Karol-Chik testified Friday. “However we by no means considered who could also be driving them.”
Kwak and Karol-Chik have each pleaded responsible in Bartell’s killing, and, as a part of their plea offers, are required to testify in opposition to Koenig.
Prosecutors say Koenig threw the deadly rock. Koenig’s protection attorneys say Kwak threw the deadly rock.
Following his arrest six days after the killing, Karol-Chik for months instructed investigators that Kwak threw the rock that killed Bartell, together with by way of three proffer interviews during which he provided info to prosecutors so as to search a plea settlement.
Not till a fourth and remaining proffer interview did Karol-Chik lastly title Koenig as the one that threw the final rock, Karol-Chik admitted on cross-examination.
“You knew what you wanted to say on this final interview,” Koenig’s protection lawyer, Martin Stuart, stated throughout cross-examination.
“I did,” Karol-Chik stated.
“And that was that Joe threw the rock?” Stuart stated.
“I knew that I needed to inform them the reality,” Karol-Chik stated.
“Properly, you began out saying that you just aren’t 100% certain that Joe threw the rock, and by the tip of (the interview), you’re?”
“That’s right,” Karol-Chik testified.
He testified Friday that he lied till the final interview to attempt to defend Koenig, who was on the time his greatest good friend and “nearly shut sufficient to be brothers.” Kwak was a more moderen good friend who the pair had recognized for a couple of month, Karol-Chik testified.
He stated he agreed to pin the crime on Kwak after speaking with Koenig after Bartell’s demise.
“We went over all the pieces that occurred and it was at the moment that Joe stated to me that we wouldn’t have to fret about it, we’ll simply say that Zach did it,” Karol-Chik testified.
However underneath cross-examination, Karol-Chik testified he genuinely believed Kwak threw the deadly rock and that he thought he remembered Kwak dealing with that exact rock, which was larger than the opposite rocks they’d collected that evening. He testified that he instructed Kwak to not use that rock, as a result of it was too huge, however that Kwak instructed him that he would throw it if Karol-Chik wouldn’t.
The rock weighed 9.3 kilos, testified Dan Manka, an investigator with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Workplace.
Stuart advised Karol-Chik pointed a finger at Koenig solely to safe a plea cope with the district lawyer’s workplace that might enable him to keep away from a life jail sentence, and that he tailor-made his testimony to match the prosecution’s concept of occasions after prosecutors provided no deal after the primary three interviews during which he named Kwak as the one that threw the deadly rock.
“Was the reality that Joseph Koenig threw the rock that killed Alexa Bartell?” Chief Deputy District Lawyer Katharine Decker requested on redirect.
“Sure,” Karol-Chik testified.
Karol-Chik’s testimony Friday adopted Kwak’s testimony Thursday and differed on a number of particulars. Kwak stated he didn’t throw any rocks throughout the a number of hours that he frolicked with the opposite youngsters that evening and had requested to go residence; Karol-Chik stated all three youngsters threw the rocks and that Kwak by no means requested to go away.
Karol-Chik additionally stated Koenig was driving at about 80 mph when he threw the rock that killed Bartell, whereas Kwak stated the velocity was 103 mph. Each testified that Koenig sped up earlier than the deadly throw.
The 2 males’s testimony aligned on the main occasions of the evening, together with that they carried out a sequence of escalating pranks and rock-throwing earlier than Bartell was killed.
After her demise, Karol-Chik stated he knew they’d “(expletived) up” when he drove by the world once more later that evening and noticed emergency autos, he testified.
Neither Karol-Chik nor Kwak has been sentenced; their sentencings are set for early Might. Karol-Chik faces between 35 and 72 years in jail; Kwak might be sentenced to between 20 and 32 years in jail.
Koenig faces a compulsory life jail sentence if he’s convicted of first-degree homicide.
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